If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

‘In a hole in the ground
there lived a somewhat retarded, orally fixated pre-adolescent who
was almost pathological in his refusal to interact in a socially
responsible way with the outer world. This is the story of how he
overcame, with a little help from his psychologist, some of his
neurotic compulsions.’

This ‘Freudian’
summary of The Hobbit
is, of course, a blatant oversimplification, but it serves exactly
because it highlights the salient points in an exaggerated fashion.
Anyone inclined to pursue a Freudian line of inquiry any further
would find a plethora of suitable items that lend themselves to an
interpretation within such a framework. Bilbo, for example, acquires
a phallic sword, which he does not hesitate to stick into hairy
spiders when the occasion arises … The reader soon realises, after
the first shock of outrage and/or amusement (depending on one’s
disposition), that such a popular ‘pseudo-Freudian’ analysis of
Tolkien’s work is based on a misconception of both Freud’s
original intentions and of Tolkien’s literary work. Freud’s
approach is primarily a method used to treat real-life patients with
psychological problems. Nevertheless, Freudian methods and concepts
can be and have been applied to literary texts<sup>1</sup>and their protagonists in order to shed some light on some of the
underlying issues or, indirectly, on the psychological setup of the
author. Yet, as C.S. Lewis has pointed out some time ago, the latter
does not really constitute literary criticism.<sup>2</sup>Furthermore,
an analysis of the literary protagonists presupposes a certain degree
of psychological realism – and here Tolkien refuses to co-operate.
Bilbo and Frodo are the most ‘modern’ characters (see Shippey
2000:7) in both The Hobbit
and The Lord of the Rings
and might thus be successfully subjected to a Freudian analysis.
However, most protagonists are simply lacking the minimal
requirements needed for a meaningful discussion within a Freudian
framework – as Peter Jackson’s treatment of Aragorn illustrates.
Tolkien’s Aragorn changes and develops merely in the way he
presents himself to the world – from Strider to Aragorn, son of
Arathorn, to King Elessar. The basic ‘psychological’ setup (if we
are to use this rather ill-fitting category) does not change (see
Veugen 2005) and Aragorn is, in my view, an intentionally ‘flat’
character. Jackson obviously felt uncomfortable with presenting such
a protagonist. He therefore changed him into a ‘modern’ character
haunted by self-doubts and insecurities which he is finally able to
overcome, and this way re-shaped Aragorn into a protagonist with whom
the audience can identify.<sup>3</sup>As a result, Jackson’s Aragorn is psychologically more realistic
and appealing to modern readers, and, in contrast to Tolkien’s
protagonist, it makes sense to discuss his development within a
psychological framework. Thus, a (Freudian) psychological analysis of
Tolkien’s literary protagonists is either bound to be pointless in
most cases or, if it were to be meaningful, requires a re-writing of
the text – neither of which makes sense to me.

There are, of
course, other approaches based on the theories of Freud and other
psychologists. We have, on the one hand, post-Freudian (literary)<sup>4</sup>critics such as Jacques Lacan, whose ideas and theories have proven
highly attractive to literary scholars. Applications of their ideas
on Tolkien’s work are rare, though not impossible (see Nagy 2006),
and they yield ‘meaningful’ results. On the other hand, we have a
number of literary critics who look at Tolkien’s writings in a
Jungian light, and it is their approach that I am going to discuss in
greater depth in this paper.<sup>5</sup>The
immediate motivation for such an investigation comes from the
publication of two books. The first one is Skogemann’s
interpretation of The Lord of the Rings
within a Jungian framework. It was originally published in Danish in
2004 and has become available in English translation in 2009. The
second is the Red Book
(DasRote
Buch, originally entitled Liber
Novus), a facsimile edition (with
transcription/translation of the handwritten text) of Jung’s notes
on his dreams and visions, which he started to write down in this
folio-sized, illuminated volume from 1913/14 onwards. The fact that
both Tolkien and Jung wrote ‘Red Books’ and that both shared a
kind of ‘Great Wave Dream’, struck me as noteworthy.<sup>6</sup>These events may not constitute an example of pure synchronicity,<sup>7</sup>yet they intrigued me sufficiently to take up once more the thread of
a possible ‘Jungian’ connection in Tolkien’s work. I had first
come across concrete evidence for Tolkien’s acquaintance with
Jung’s concept while working on the Professor’s academic papers
in the Bodleian in Summer 2006. Two references to Jung are to be
found on a single sheet of paper among his notes for the lecture ‘On
Fairy-stories’ (Bodleian Tolkien MS. 14, Folio 55 recto; facsimile
in Tolkien 2008:170), consisting of the single name ‘Jung’ in a
list of authors and scholars to be mentioned, and the note ‘Jung
Psych of the unconscious’ on the same page (see also Tolkien
2008:129). What Tolkien thought about Jung and his theories is,
however, not known. In the end, he did not comment on Jung in his
‘Fairy-stories’ lecture. Neither do his published letters and
other writings make any direct reference to Jung’s ideas and
theories, even though other members of the Inklings, notably C.S.
Lewis and Owen Barfield, were acquainted with Jung’s writings.<sup>8</sup>We can only speculate about why Tolkien seems to have avoided any
direct and prolonged examination of Jung’s ideas. In the case of
Freud we may blame a temperamental incompatibility for Tolkien’s
dislike of psychological (and especially psycho-sexual)
interpretations, yet with Jung the opposite is more likely: the two
were drawing water from the same enchanted well. This might very well
be the reason why he instinctively tried to keep a certain distance.
Tolkien, if we are to believe his retrospective account of the (often
nocturnal) writing process, was guided and inspired largely by his
‘unconscious’<sup>9</sup>– and images and concepts that originated in the ‘collective
unconscious’.<sup>10</sup>The emergence and development of Strider/Aragorn, one of the most
‘archetypal’ human figures in The
Lord of the Rings, is a good example,
as is the slow unravelling of the true identity of Bilbo’s ring as
the Ring.<sup>11</sup>This creative symbiotic communication between Tolkien’s unconscious
layers and his writer-persona might have been severely disturbed if
he had started to investigate the underlying processes and impulses.<sup>12</sup>Tolkien’s stories and tales might have, in the end, helped him to
come to terms with some of his ‘unresolved’ psychological issues
and brought him forward on the path of individuation, yet there is
the very acute danger that they would, at the same time, lose their
primary status as works of literary art.<sup>13</sup>The Legendarium, as a consequence, would have become merely a
personal (though rather extensive) footnote in the history of Jungian
analysis. We can therefore be grateful that Tolkien refrained from
using his tales and stories as ‘therapeutic tools’ and treated
them as works of art, polishing, refining and, in the end, sharing
them with a wider audience. Thus they have lost some of their
immediate personal relevance yet, in return, gained greatly in
general importance and fulfil one of the functions of art, which
Jung, in an essay written in 1922 (quoted in Walker 2002:100-101),
defined as “educating the spirit of the age, conjuring up forms in
which the age is most lacking. The unsatisfied yearning of the artist
reaches back to the primordial image in the unconscious which is best
fitted to compensate the inadequacy and one-sidedness of the
present.”

I have briefly touched
upon the dangers of ‘Freudian’ literary criticism, which focuses
almost entirely on the linguistic dimension of the text and on its
personal relevance for the author’s psyche. Jungian criticism, by
contrast, privileges the psyche’s imagery and its archetypal
relevance. It avoids the ‘Freudian’ pitfalls, yet is not entirely
devoid of other weaknesses. Steve Walker, a professor of comparative
literature, summarizes the dangers of Jungian literary criticism as
follows:

In the eyes of its detractors, Jungian criticism
may fail to draw a clear enough distinction between intrapsychic
imagery and aesthetic imagery. Intrapsychic imagery is a spontaneous
product of the unconscious. Aesthetic imagery, for all the analogies
it presents to intrapsychic imagery, is a product of literary
tradition and conscious literary elaboration. To put the criticism
bluntly: a literary text is not an archetypal dream and should not be
interpreted as though it were one.
(Walker 2002:145-146)

It cannot be the
function of psychological literary criticism to provide a
psychoanalytical discussion of the author’s or the protagonist’s
psyche, but like all other literary criticism, it “must meet a
criterion of usefulness. It must enrich the understanding of a text
and increase the fund of perceptions associated with our reading. […]
Reductive interpretation may be useful in discussions of
psychological matters, but it does not make for good literary
criticism. A literary critic’s first duty is to the text” (Walker
2002:148). Furthermore, a “psychological reading of the text does
not, however, displace other readings; rather, it enriches the
interpretation of the text in unexpected and original ways” (Walker
2002:146). If O’Neill’s (1979:16) characterisation of Tolkien’s
work as “probably the clearest repository of Jungian themes in
recent literature” is correct, then we can expect some results from
a Jungian analysis. In the following paragraph I will briefly survey
in how far Jungian criticism of Tolkien’s work lives up to these
criteria.

I would like to
start with the most recent monograph, Pia Skogemann’s 2009 Where
the Shadows Lie. It is written in an
almost jargon-free, easily understandable English – almost too
‘easy’ for my taste, yet maybe perfect for the main (American)
target readership. Although Skogemann introduces and explains the
main critical terms (archetype, archetypal image), she does not place
her approach into the larger framework of Jungian studies. The book
more or less retells the story of the central characters and provides
‘psychological notes’ and explanations. We learn that the four
hobbits (Frodo, Sam, Merry and Pippin) represent the four
psychological functions (thinking, feeling, sensation, and intuition
respectively), that Tom Bombadil is a trickster figure and Goldberry
a typical anima figure, and that Boromir is the shadow to Aragorn the
hero figure etc. The interpretations proposed by Skogemann are,
within a Jungian framework, understandable and easy to follow, but
the ‘net profit’ from reading the 200-odd pages is very slim
indeed. Too much of the text consists of a simple re-telling of the
story and the actual critical analysis often takes up only a fraction
of the space and does not penetrate deeply enough. I could not help
getting the impression that the book is aimed mainly at Jungians who
have not read The Lord of the Rings
yet who want to know more about the occurrence of archetypal images
in this popular work. Furthermore, there are no references to
secondary sources within the text (a short bibliography at the end
lists the most important studies referred to) and only a meagre
handful of studies on Tolkien have been used. This lack of
Tolkien-expertise – and simple care – is also reflected in the
fact that some of the Danish names have not been ‘backtranslated’<sup>14</sup>or that Skogemann (resp. her translator), when discussing the
function of fairy stories according to Tolkien, talks about
‘escapism’ instead of, correctly, ‘escape’ (Skogemann
2009:1). Where the Shadows Lie
is, therefore, an example of a rather mechanistic and limited
‘application’ of a Jungian grid to The
Lord of the Rings and Skogemann fails
to put her findings into a wider (literary) critical context. The
analysis remains reductive, merely illustrating the truth that
complex literary texts are more than archetypal patterns.

As a consequence,
Timothy R. O’Neill’s 1979 study The
Individuated Hobbit: Jung, Tolkien and the Archetypes of Middle-earth
still remains the unsurpassed standard work on the topic. O’Neill
first provides a brief yet clear and succinct introduction to the
main theories in the study of the human mind (notably behaviourism,
psychodynamic theories, and humanism) before discussing and placing
Jung’s approach within the field. He then attempts (competently, as
I think) an outline of the Jungian theoretical framework and gives
definitions of the key-terms such as ‘archetype’,<sup>15</sup>‘anima’,<sup>16</sup>‘shadow’,<sup>17</sup>‘(collective) unconscious’, ‘individuation’,<sup>18</sup>etc. with definitions – in contrast to Skogemann, who merely
provides a link to a website where the reader may find further
information. O’Neill (1979:153) is also very much aware of the
limitations of a ‘Jungian reading’ and writes: “The point of
this book has not been that The Lord of
the Rings is about Self-realization.
[…] It would be unfair (and, I think, inaccurate) to suggest that
Professor Tolkien was trying to teach us a lesson about theory and
construct in analytical psychology, nor yet to present an allegory, a
sort of psychological Pilgrim’s
Progress.” He (1979:xiv) merely hopes
that his study “will deepen the effect of the story, make its
message more lucid and personal.” And this he accomplishes beyond
any doubt – not least since he does not limit his analysis to the
‘epic-novelistic’ The Lord of the
Rings, but puts a major focus on the
‘mythical’ narratives of The
Silmarillion (1977). Myths, next to
‘archetypal dreams’, are the best gateways to the collective
unconscious. They are, as Walker (2002:19) argues, “narrative
elaborations of archetypal images (the conscious representations of
the unconscious instincts) [that in turn are representations of
archetypes, i.e.] imprinted patterns of behavior left behind by
untold ages of human evolution.<sup>19</sup>Seen from this perspective, myths are culturally elaborated
‘representations of situations.’ They enable us to re-experience
consciously the unconscious instinctual processes of the psyche.”O’Neill’s
analysis, in contrast to Skogemann’s, succeeds mainly because he
wisely decides to discuss The Lord of
the Rings within the ‘mythical
framework’ established by The
Silmarillion. This means highlighting
elements and aspects that are, from a ‘conventional’ literary
critic’s point of view, marginal. Thus, the exact relationship
between Elrond Half-elven and his mortal brother Elros, first king of
Númenor, and his descendants is, from a narratological point
of view, of minor importance. Within a Jungian framework, however, it
acquires prime significance so that, as O’Neill (1979:129-152)
illustrates, the marriage between Aragorn Elessar, the descendant of
Elros, and Arwen Undomíel, daughter of Elrond, comes to
signify the achievement of the Individuation of the West. As a
consequence, The Individuated Hobbit
provides not so much a discussion of the literary qualities of The
Lord of the Rings but explores and
discloses its mythic and, by implication, archetypal dimension. It
therefore does not displace other readings but rather “enriches the
interpretation of the text in unexpected and original ways” (Walker
2002:146).

There exists, to my
knowledge, only one paper on Tolkien and Jung that was published in a
generally accessible form before O’Neill’s study appeared in
1979.<sup>20</sup>This is Dorothy Matthews’s ‘The Psychological Journey of Bilbo
Baggins’, which appeared in Jared Lobdell’s A
Tolkien Compass (1975; reprinted in the
2003 edition of the same book). Matthews starts out with very general
parallels between traditional fairy tales, The
Hobbit and other children’s
literature classics (Alice’s
Adventures in Wonderland, The
Wind in the Willows, Peter
Rabbit) – parallels such as ‘falling
into a hole’ etc. Interestingly, Matthews also argues for seeing
Freudian symbolism in the naming of the swords (phallus, coming to
manhood) and in passing makes reference to a plethora of sexual
symbols such as locks, keys, caves, cups, chalices etc. Luckily, she
leaves it at that and does not pursue this ‘Freudian’ approach
any further, but continues with identifying monsters and adversaries
as externalizations of psychic phenomena and Bilbo’s journey as a
metaphor for the process of individuation. The hobbit has to leave
the Shire, where his masculinity has been suppressed, in order to
find a new balance between his male and female sides. The ‘usual
suspects’ in matters of archetypal images also make an appearance:
Gandalf as a personification of the archetypal image of the Wise Old
Man, Gollum (more debatably) as that of the Devouring Mother and,
finally, the Ring as the archetypal image of the Self. Matthews also
makes a few good and original points, e.g. when she interprets the
spiders of Mirkwood attacking Bilbo as psychic fixations that have to
be resisted, or that Smaug is not killed by Bilbo since Tolkien wants
him to remain ‘Everyman’ and therefore prevents him from passing
into the epic hero category. This point illustrates how
psychoanalytical criticism can contribute successfully to a deeper
understanding of structural-narratological points.On
the whole, Matthews’s paper is a good example
of the strength and weaknesses of the Jungian approach, which is why
I have given her so much space. Her discussion illustrates, on the
one hand, that the application of Jungian categories can provide some
new insights and, especially, is able to highlight those ‘archetypal
motifs’ that The Hobbit
shares with folk tales and fairy stories. On the other hand, it
(unwittingly) brings to the fore some of the more problematic aspects
of Jungian literary criticism. The most obvious danger, in my view,
consists in the critic’s ‘uncritical’ identification of
archetypal images and motifs. I would like to discuss this by means
of three slightly differing examples: the Ring as the archetypal
image of the Self, Gandalf as the embodiment of the archetypal image
of the Wise Old Man, and the question of who or what represents the
(or a) Shadow.
Rings, just like
jewels, often symbolise the archetypal image of the Self. Yet whereas
jewels occur quite frequently as obvious symbols of the Self in the
Tolkien’s writings,<sup>21</sup>rings are a bit more problematic in the context of his universe.
Melkor coveted and stole the Silmarils, but neither he nor any of the
other Valar has ever been able to create anything like the Silmarils
(read: to attain Selfhood). They are the product of elvish craft
working in harmony with the divine light of inspiration. Rings, by
contrast, seem associated less with inspiration and divine light than
with enslavement and power. Jung has noted that rings often function
as embodiments of the archetypal image of the Self because of their
perfect round shapes, which stand for the ‘wholeness’ and
self-sufficiency of the Self. Most of Tolkien’s rings, and
especially the Ring, have a different meaning and it takes a good
deal of blindness towards the narrative context to equate the Ring
with the Jungian symbol for the Self – as Matthews (2003:32)
does.<sup>22</sup>One is tempted to repeat Tolkien’s famous dictum concerning the
relationship between ‘his’ ring and Wagner’s Ring
of the Nibelungs: ‘Both rings were
round, and there the resemblance ceases.’ The same is very much
true for ‘Jungian rings’ in Tolkien’s work. The lesson to be
learnt from such blatant misidentifications is clear: Jungian
archetypal images are universal, but the symbols representing them
are not. Rings may symbolise the Self – or they may not. It
depends, as so often, on the context and the author, and a
responsible critic must crosscheck his or her interpretation of the
symbols against the actual textual evidence; otherwise we are running
the grave danger that everything becomes everything.<sup>23</sup>Let us now turn to Gandalf as my second example.
The wizard, as most
Jungian critics agree, exhibits the typical traits of the Wise Old
Man archetypal image, both in his outward appearance and in his
behaviour. Indeed, Gandalf would be an ideal choice if one were asked
by someone unfamiliar with Jung’s ideas to provide a typical
example of this archetypal image; to try and expound the similarities
between the Wise Old Man and Gandalf is likely to produce tautologies
– Gandalf is
the Wise Old Man, and the Wise Old Man is Gandalf.<sup>24</sup>However, Gandalf is not only
the Wise Old Man archetypal image! It would be more accurate to
describe him as the one protagonist in The
Lord of the Rings (and The
Hobbit) who comes closest to the
archetypal image, that it is so prominent in him that we are sorely
tempted to disregard all the other traits and see him solely as the
Wise Old Man. Yet, literary critics must not yield to such a
temptation – their duty is first and foremost to the text, which
presents us, in this and in most other cases, a literary character
that is more than an archetypal image. It is Gandalf, the literary
character, who undergoes the process of individuation, who ‘meets’
his Shadow in form of the Balrog of Moria, confronts and
‘incorporates’ it so that he is able to return as Gandalf the
White.

The archetypal
image of the Shadow just mentioned is one of the most central and, in
Jung’s own view, one of the most important archetypes.<sup>25</sup>It contains the repressed
weaknesses, shortcomings, and socially not acceptable (primitive)
instincts and impulses. Jung describes his first encounter with his
personal Shadow in a dream as follows:

It was night in some unknown place, and I was making slow and painful
headway against a mighty wind. Dense fog was lying along everywhere.
I had my hands cupped around a tiny light which threatened to go out
at any moment. Everything depended on my keeping this little light
alive. Suddenly I had the feeling that something was coming up behind
me. I looked back and saw a gigantic black figure following me. But
at the same moment I was conscious, in spite of my terror, that I
must keep my little light going through night and wind, regardless of
all dangers. (Jung quoted in O’Neill 1979:27)
Jung awoke with the
realization that the dark follower was nothing more than his own
shadow cast on the mist by the flickering candle and interpreted it
as the archetypal image of his personal Shadow, whereas the candle
represents the light of consciousness. Coming to terms with one’s
Shadow is one of the most crucial tasks in the process of
individuation and Shadow figures play a prominent role in literature<sup>26</sup>– which is why critics have been ready to identify ‘Shadow
figures’ in Tolkien’s work. They often make only a brief yet
crucial appearance, such as the Balrog of Moria or the Oathbreakers
on the Paths of the Dead. Tolkien presents
the latter as a shadowy mass, and it is only in Peter Jackson’s
interpretation that the Shadow becomes more personal by means of the
confrontation between Aragorn Elessar and the nameless King of the
Dead. This is part of the aforementioned ‘psychologisation’ of
Aragorn in the movies and fits the Jungian pattern of individuation
nicely. The identification of additional Shadow figures is more
controversial, not least since most of them are autonomous characters
and no mere spectres or ‘demons’. Nevertheless, several critics
have pointed out that many of the protagonists in The
Lord of the Rings possess a kind of
‘shadow figure counterpart’: Frodo vs. Gollum, Théoden vs.
Denethor, Aragorn vs. Boromir, Gandalf vs. Saruman, Sam vs. Ted
Sandyman, Tom Bombadil vs. the Barrow-wight, Galadriel vs. Shelob
etc. Of those, only the pairing of Frodo and Gollum as his ‘dark
alter ego’ is undisputed and alternative groupings have been
offered for some of the other characters, such as Aragorn vs. the
Ringwraiths (Grant 1981/2004:97/174) or Aragorn vs. Denethor
(Kotowski 1992:149).<sup>27</sup>The listed examples give a good idea of how vaguely the term ‘shadow’
is used. None of these ‘shadowy figures’ could possibly be
identified with the Jungian Shadow proper, even though all of them
contain (to varying degrees) some shadow energy, i.e. aspects of the
Jungian Shadow.Let
me illustrate this point by means of Gollum, whom I see as ‘Frodo
gone wrong’ rather than as his personal Shadow. Gollum, when we
first meet him, represents a person who has been taken over by his
Shadow, but whose former self (Sméagol = Stinker) is still
around and able to re-establish itself, at least temporarily, under
favourable circumstances. He is thus obviously an autonomous
character with individual personal traits and no mere archetypal
image.<sup>28</sup>The same applies more or less to all the other figures.<sup>29</sup>Galadriel, for instance, is clearly a personification of the
benevolent side of the Anima, and as such structurally related to the
White Goddess and her ‘Christian’ personification, the Virgin
Mary.<sup>30</sup>Yet even so she still possesses her ‘threatening side’, as
becomes evident in Frodo’s vision of the elven queen as “tall
beyond measurement, and beautiful beyond enduring, terrible and
worshipful” (LotR
366). Gollum and Frodo, looked at from a distance, come close to
being ‘Ego’ and ‘Shadow’, but they are always more than that.
This is born out by the climactic confrontation at the Sammath Naur
on Mount Doom. Gollum bites off Frodo’s finger with the Ring on it,
slips and falls into the Fire below, where both Gollum and the Ring
are destroyed. Critics interpret this dramatic event different ways.
Kotowski (1992:149), for example, argues that the destruction of evil
and the lack of a happy ending for Frodo illustrate how Jungian
Tolkien’s thinking is. Frodo has failed to ‘integrate’ his
Shadow (i.e. Gollum) and the resulting fits of depression are the
consequences of a miscarried individuation and the loss of an
important part of his personality. Such an interpretation makes sense
only as long as one does not stick to the text too closely. In my
view, it is Frodo’s actual personal Shadow that has finally taken
possession of him when he claimed the Ring by putting it on his
finger.<sup>31</sup>Gollum has been and remains an external agent, linked to Frodo
through their shared experiences and their special relationship. He
‘rescues’ Frodo from the dominance of his Shadow, and in doing so
he cripples him physically as well as psychologically.<sup>32</sup>Flieger’s comment on the passage is also of interest. Frodo’s
battle, she argues, is thus “not against darkness without but
against darkness within” (Flieger 1981/2004:59/144). She continues:

It is characteristic of Tolkien, however, that he does not end on
this note [i.e. with Frodo defeated, as Beowulf is]. Frodo loses, but
in losing he wins a greater victory. The climax is designed to show
that just as surely as Frodo’s action is inevitable, so is
Gollum’s. Frodo will put on the Ring, and Gollum will be driven to
seize it. In so doing he saves Frodo and destroys the Ring. Frodo’s
dark side, externalized as Gollum, destroys the actual dark within
him, and the maddened Gollum, exulting in possession, falls with the
Ring into the fire. Evil destroys itself.
(Flieger
1981/2004:60/144)
The problem here is that
Flieger mixes categories. She no longer sticks to a purely Jungian
framework but introduces ‘moral’ categories, so that we end up
with a ‘Manichean’ dichotomy. The Shadow, a non-moralistic
category in Jung, is turned into the moral-religious category ‘evil’,
which cannot, of course, be ‘incorporated’ but must be vanquished
and, if possible, destroyed. By doing so she is probably closer to
Tolkien’s original intention than a purely Jungian interpretation,
but the analysis is not without internal contradictions.Tucev
(2005), as the most recent critic<sup>33</sup>to comment on the climactic confrontation between Frodo and Gollum,
argues for making the important distinction between Gollum as the
embodiment of the power shadow and Sméagol, the ‘gold in the
dark side’, who becomes Frodo’s ally. Her interpretation of
events follows Robert Bly’s concept of the five stages in the
development of one’s relationship with the shadow. In the fifth and
final stage, “we attempt to retrieve or, as Bly poetically puts it,
to eat our shadow. At the physical plane, it looks as if Gollum has
eaten Frodo’s finger; at the inner plane, it is actually Frodo who
has eaten his shadow, so that its outer manifestation no longer needs
to exist and therefore disappears in the chasm” (Tucev 2005:103).
The result is a sadder but also wiser Frodo.The
text supports Tucev’s analysis as far as it goes, yet I’m not
sure whether Frodo could be considered an example of a successful
individuation – the confrontations with the various Shadow figures
(Ringwraiths, Shelob, Gollum) have left him not only a wiser and
sadder man, but also maimed and no longer at ease within this world.

As the discussion of
these studies has shown, literary critics using a Jungian approach
often run into self-contradictions and problems as soon as they
neglect to differentiate between archetypal images, moral-religious
categories, and literary characters or protagonists. The latter may
very well participate in the process of individuation or can be
assessed within a moral framework, whereas an archetypal image
constitutes a non-moral and a-personal category.<sup>34</sup>Literary critics – or Jungian psychoanalysts working in the field –
must take care to distinguish clearly between these levels. At the
same time it is absolutely necessary to relate the results of an
analysis of the archetypal images and motifs to the larger literary
framework of the story, which includes protagonists, plot, and
ethics. It is simply not enough to demonstrate that, for example,
Gandalf is a personification of the Wise Old Man. The identification
of archetypal images and motifs is a necessary first task to be done
in the analysis of a text. In a next step, the results have to be
made relevant for the discussion of the aesthetic, ethical and
literary dimension of the work – and this is where most critics
falter. Skogemann’s study is a good example and represents, to my
mind, a failure because she has not related her ‘psychoanalytical
(Jungian) reading’ to the literary dimension of The
Lord of the Rings. Even O’Neill does
not do so; but in his case this is due to the conscious decision to
focus on the mythical dimension of Tolkien’s fiction. His book is
primarily concerned with uncovering the overall mythical structure of
the Professor’s work, to place the more ‘novelistic-epic’
narratives within the overarching and larger context of the
Legendarium and, thus, to contribute to a deeper understanding of the
creative ‘mythopoetic’ impulse. His ‘reading’ does not
replace or make redundant – or even pretend to be – a literary
critical analysis but is best seen as an enriching, complementary
approach.

There is undoubtedly
something in Tolkien’s work that invites a reading within a Jungian
framework and most of his writings have a distinct ‘mythic’
quality, as can be most clearly perceived in The
Silmarillion. The
Hobbit and The
Lord of the Rings, too, partake in this
‘mythic discourse’, although to a somewhat lesser degree. Many of
his protagonists are closer to the ‘flat’ characters of myths or
fairy stories, which Jungians consider reflections of the collective
unconscious. As a consequence, the ‘novelistic veneer’ on most of
Tolkien’s figures is very thin indeed, and the archetypal image –
or its archetypal component – is often so close to the surface that
it is shining through. It is therefore tempting to forget that one is
not dealing with a myth per se,
but with a consciously and artistically elaborated piece of fiction.<sup>35</sup>Of course, Tolkien would have been exceedingly pleased by the
‘mythic’ effect, interpreting it as proof for the efficacy of his
little scheme of passing off his writings as ‘editions and
translations’.Why, then, do
critics often stop as soon as they have identified the archetypal
images. For many of them, the simple identification of Jungian
archetypal images is
the answer indeed – often forgetting to tell us the initial
question, which must be something like ‘Why does The
Lord of the Rings have such an
overwhelming emotional impact on me and on others?’This
‘emotional response problem’ is not, unfortunately, limited to
the Jungian approach and has hampered the development of Tolkien
criticism for decades. It is one thing to like a book, but another to
analyse and assess it as a piece of literature. One may discover that
one does not like a book of undoubted literary quality, whereas one
responds enthusiastically to a trashy novel (the reverse is, of
course, as likely). The Lord of the
Rings especially seems to have ‘spoken’
to many of its readers via its archetypal images and motifs and
elicited, as is to be expected from archetypal images, a strong
emotional response. This emotional response has baffled many critical
readers, not least since they are aware that this effect cannot be
explained by style, plot-structure or other ‘conventional’
literary categories – and instigated an investigation into the
origins of this phenomenon. However, emotional involvement and its
explanation do not constitute legitimate literary criticism. They may
have a place in reader-response studies, but they should not make up
the end-point of a literary analysis. Unfortunately, a great part of
‘Tolkien criticism’ seems to have its origin in the
understandable desire to prove that the book so ardently loved is
also a ‘good’ book in a literary sense,<sup>36</sup>and ‘literary criticism’ becomes another way of exploring the
reader’s psyche.

I have taken
Matthews’s paper as an early (flawed) example to discuss some of
the problems and challenges posed by a psychoanalytical approach, and
we may expect matters to improve with time. This has been,
unfortunately, not the case. As mentioned, O’Neill’s monograph of
1979 constitutes a major landmark in the uncovering of the
Legendarium’s mythical-archetypal structure. After that, only a
handful of papers on the topic have been published. Most of them
focus on clearly limited aspects of Tolkien’s fictional output and
although the findings often constitute valuable additions to our
growing knowledge about the Professor’s work and contribute to a
better understanding of the texts, they seem to have made
(comparatively speaking) little impact on the overall development in
the field. I see three reasons for this. Firstly, literary criticism
within a Jungian framework has a long tradition (going back to Jung
himself), but it never became as widespread or influential as its
‘Freudian’ counterpart.<sup>37</sup>Secondly, scholars working in this tradition seem blissfully ignorant
of their predecessors’ work and, thus, prone to begin their
analysis each time from scratch. Of all the scholars known to me,
only Skogemann makes a reference to a predecessor.<sup>38</sup>As a consequence, we lack the critical dialogue that is necessary for
the establishment of a tradition. Thirdly, many of the scholars
working with a Jungian approach seem to be not very conversant with
the state of the art in Tolkien criticism, to say the least, and even
their grasp of the primary texts of the Legendarium is sometimes
doubtful.<sup>39</sup>This is, of course, detrimental to their work and lessens their
impact considerably. What we need are competent Tolkien scholars who
study Jung’s ideas and use them in their discussion of the
Professor’s work rather than Jungians sauntering for a brief spell
into the field of Tolkien studies.

My discussion of
Tolkien’s work within a Jungian framework may have given the
impression that I am somewhat critical of such an approach. In truth,
my critical stance is the result of disappointment rather than basic
opposition. Jungian literary criticism is, in my opinion, a method
very well suited for the exploration of the psychological dimension
of Tolkien’s fiction. The Professor has obviously succeeded in
creating a work of art rooted in the Western tradition that ‘speaks’
to millions of readers, and a Jungian approach can give a reason for
this success, namely that The Lord of
the Rings constitutes a compensatory
set of archetypal images that our age and culture requires for
greater balance.<sup>40</sup><sup></sup>Yet,
the ‘congeniality’ of the Jungian framework also harbours some
grave dangers – as the preceding review has shown. To wit, it is
not always easy to talk meaningfully about the mythical structures
and elements by means of equally ‘mythical’ language and images,
as habitually used in Jungian criticism. The subject of the analysis
becomes too easily confused with the concepts and terminology of what
should be the meta-language; the ‘critical’ distance between
‘theory’ and ‘object’ is often dangerously small and causes
scholars to confuse and mix the two levels. To make matters worse,
Tolkien’s protagonists often oscillate between mythical archetypal
images and ‘flat novelistic characters’ – a phenomenon which,
of course, invites such a confusion of levels. Although the effect on
the critics is deplorable, it is this ‘hybridisation’ of
archetypal characteristics and ‘realism’ (lacking a better term
to describe the ‘realist traits’) that contributes to the
fascination of Tolkien’s work. Future studies must build on the
works of past critics and, as some have already attempted, go beyond
the mere identification of archetypal images and motifs and explore
the complex relationship between archetypal elements and their
literary presentation and functions in Tolkien’s work. The
situation in the field is comparable to the one in ‘medieval source
studies’ some decades ago; it took some time until critics left the
positivistic approach of merely listing the sources, parallels and
analogues behind and dared to tread upon new critical ground.Jungian readings have to
offer more than ‘In a hole in the ground there lived a halfling
who, together with some helper-figures, became a wiser and
individuated hobbit’ – even though such a reading is not
incorrect.

Notes

1
Most prominently by Freud himself, e.g. in his essay ‘The Uncanny’
(1919) where he discusses E.T.A. Hoffmann’s tale ‘The Sandman’.
See also Freud’s discussions of works by Shakespeare, Goethe, and
Dostoevsky in Das
Unheimliche. Aufsätze zur Literatur.

2
See Walker (2002:145), who comments: “Such reductive criticism
attempted to explain the text primarily in terms of the author’s
psychobiography.” See also Vladimir Nabokov’s numerous and
forceful attacks against the ‘Viennese witch doctor’.

3
See Flieger’s perceptive remark on Aragorn: “We are not like
him, and we know it. We admire him, but we do not identify with
him.” (Flieger 1981/2004:41/124)

4
Many of these are no literary critics per se, nor are their versions
and theories primarily intended for literary criticism (pace Lacan).
Nevertheless, literary critics use their theories, whatever their
original intention was.

5
I will limit my discussion to Jungian approaches proper and
disregard studies that use related (yet differing) theories, such as
Anne C. Petty’s books that make use of Joseph Campbell’s ideas.
I have also disregarded books like the one by Schwarz (2003), who
simply cannot be taken seriously.

6
Jung’s dream-vision of
Europe being inundated by a great flood occurred in October 1913
(see Jung 2009b:196) and could be interpreted as a foreshadowing of
WW I. Tolkien mentions his dream of the “ineluctable Wave” in
Letter 257 (Tolkien 1981:347).

7
Synchronicity is
defined as the experience
of two or more events
that are apparently <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Causality" target="_blank">causally
unrelated</a>, yet that occur together in a meaningful
manner.

8
See especially Lewis (1969) and Barfield (1988:133-141). See also
Grant (1981/2004:89/165).

9
I use the term in a Jungian sense of the word. For a discussion of
the structure of the psyche according to Jung, see Jacobi
(2008:17-27).

10
“The collective
unconsciousness, being the repository of man’s experience and at
the same time the prior condition of this experience, is an image of
the world which has taken aeons to form. In this image certain
features, the archetypes or dominants, have crystallized out in the
course of time. They are the ruling powers, the gods, images of the
dominant laws and principles, and of typical, regularly occurring
events in the soul’s cycle of experience.” (Jung quoted in
Walker 2002:10).

11
Bilbo’s ring was, in the
first-edition text of The
Hobbit, merely a
magic ring. Its re-conceptualisation as the one Ring led to the
alterations in the text as found in the second and subsequent
editions of The
Hobbit. See
Anderson (2002, especially 128-136).

12
Exploring the unconscious is no trifling matter. Jung (2009b:199) is
very clear about the risks involved, and Tolkien’s comments
(voiced via his ‘spokesperson’ Ramer in ‘The Notion Club
Papers’) on the dangers of myths read almost like a description of
archetypes gone wild: “I don’t think any of us realize the
force, the daimonic force that the great myths and legends have.
[...] from the multiplication of them in many minds – and each
mind, mark you, an engine of obscured but unmeasured energy. They
are like an explosive: it may slowly yield a steady warmth to living
minds, but if suddenly detonated, it might go off with a crash: yes:
might produce a disturbance in the real primary world. / […] we
may have all been helping to stir something up. If not out of
history, at any rate out of a very powerful world of imagination and
memory. [...] perhaps of both.” (Sauron
Defeated 228/253).
See also Bachmann and Honegger (2005) for a detailed discussion of
the historical context of this passage.

13
Jung (2009b:206-207) discusses the question whether his ‘fantasies’
constitute ‘art’, as his ‘Anima’ is suggesting, and reaches
the conclusion that they are not to be considered ‘art’.

14
Thus, we find ‘Torben’
(p. 36) for English Ted Sandyman, and ‘Dysterharge’ (p. 114) for
English Dunharrow.

15
I give Walker’s (2002)
definitions since they are, to my mind, both concise and accessible
to the layperson. Archetype “designates an unconscious and
unrepresentable element of the instinctual structure of the human
psyche, and the more proper term to use for one of the pictures of
an archetype that the human mind is capable of representing isarchetypal image.
[…] From the treasure house of archetypal images are drawn the
elements, the archetypal
motifs, of
mythology” (Walker 2002:4). “There are as many archetypes as
there are “normal human situations” and relationships over which
they preside, from getting into a fight […] to falling in love
like Romeo and Juliet. […] The list of archetypes is nearly
endless.” (Walker 2002:10).

17
The Shadow is part
of the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Unc&#111;nscious_mind" target="_blank">unconscious
mind</a>, consisting of repressed
weaknesses, shortcomings, and instincts. It may be (in part) one’s
link to more primitive animal instincts, which are superseded during
early childhood by the conscious mind.

18
“In individuation the
individual integrates, at least to some degree, the inner world of
split-off personalities based on unconscious identifications,
withdraws projections, and realizes to some extent the archetype of
the Self, the foundation for the secure sense of self-identity.”
(Walker 2002:33).

19
Walker’s use of ‘evolution’ obviously differs from the
Darwinian sense of the term.

20
Patrick Grant’s more balanced paper was first published in the
winter 1973 issue of Cross
Currents (and is
now available online on the Cross
Currents website).
However, it did not reach a wider public until Isaacs and Zimbardo
selected it for their volume of Tolkien criticism, which was
published in 1981.

21
To mention only the most prominent ones: the Silmarils, the
Arkenstone, Elessar the Elfstone, and Aragorn attaining Selfhood as
Elessar = Elfstone.

22
Tucev (2005:99) gives a more convincing interpretation of the Ring:
“The power with which the Ring endows its bearer is apparently
shadow energy, inherent in the suppressed contents of the psyche,
which the Ring seems to be able to reclaim. In other words, the Ring
seems to act like an evil matchmaker, arranging a marriage between
the ego and the shadow on the unwholesome ground of a power trip.
Soon enough, in such an alliance, the ego finds itself under the
sway of the power it wanted to wield.”

24
Gandalf’s first appearance in The
Hobbit is that of
“an old man with a staff” (Hobbit
5), the archetypal image of the Old Wise Man, and it is only later
that we (and Bilbo) get to know his name. Even Gandalf’s
self-identification plays with this: “I am Gandalf, and Gandalf
means me!” (Hobbit
6) He is, however, not so much a helper-figure than a leader.

26
See, for example, Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde, Frankenstein and the
Monster, or Valentin and Orson (in the Middle English romance of the
same name).

27
Unfortunately, Kotowski does
not provide an explanation for her (not really self-evident) choice.
Presumably, the connection is to be made via Denethor’s
‘shadow-kingship’ (i.e. stewardship) vs. Aragorn’s legitimate
kingship.’

28
See Flieger (1981/2004:58/143) who identifies Frodo and Gollum as
“what psychology calls the ‘self’ and the ‘other’, the
overt personality and its opposite, the light and dark sides of
one’s nature. Jung calls this other side of mankind the ‘shadow’
as contrasted with the overt and recognized ‘ego.’” However,
Flieger (1981/2004:59/143) also warns us not to read Gollum as an
allegorical personification, but points out that he is “a full
realized character in his own right, with a considerable part to
play in the story. But he can suggest these other things as well.”

29
Shelob being the notable exception: as a descendant of Ungoliant,
she has her origin outside Arda.

30
See Tolkien (1981:172) in Letter 142, where he indirectly confirms
Robert Murray’s (Societas Jesu) opinion that Galadriel is a
representation of the Virgin Mary.

31
This interpretation is in agreement with Shippey’s (2000:140-142)
analysis of the situation.

32
The rather obvious ‘castration symbolism’ has been pointed out
before. Flieger (1981/2004:60/144), moreover, associates Frodo of
the Nine Fingers with the Maimed King of the Grail legend.

33
Skogemann’s (2009:32-34) ‘discussion’ of the passage does not
get beyond a mere summary of the action.

34
Jung (2009:208), however,
argues explicitly in favour of a personification of contents of the
unconscious, which makes Walker (2002:17) comment as follows:
“Jung’s willingness to personify the archetypes of the
unconscious is perhaps the most controversial dimension of his
theory. It is one thing to describe archetypes as mental expressions
of instincts. It is something else to describe them as animated
beings with a consciousness of their own.” The implicit question
being whether such a ‘personified’ archetype is able or even
supposed to partake in the process of individuation.

35
The literary critics working with a Jungian approach are not the
only ones to forget this. The lack of a competent, comprehensive and
sustained in-depth analysis of Tolkien’s style (pace Walker 2009)
is rather telling.

36
This is not the place to enter into an extended analysis of Tolkien
criticism, and I can merely point to the other popular trend in the
field, i.e. that of defending The
Lord of the Rings
as a morally good book – which is not really literary criticism
either.

37
This is primarily true for Europe. In America, Jung has had a much
greater impact on literary studies.